We live in strange times. While it is perhaps more important now than ever to stay on top of what is going on around the world — from the upcoming elections in November to the ever-morphing coronavirus crisis — it is equally important to escape and indulge in a guilty pleasure or two. If erotic, sci-fi comics happen to be said guilty pleasure, then I have a treat for you.
Girl meets girl. Girls fall in love. Girls travel the multiverse and discover endless worlds filled with sexually fluid, horny deviants. That about sums up “Curvy,” an erotic, sex-positive romp of a graphic novel written and illustrated by Sylvan Migdal.
At the center of this story is Anaïs, an 18-year-old wise-cracking smart-ass, whose otherwise boring life is turned upside down when she crosses paths with Fauna Lokjom, an otherworldly princess and runaway bride from Candy World. The two share an immediate intimate, physical connection.
A tale of two star-crossed lovers screwing their way across the multiverse
But their newfound romance is cut short when Fauna’s fiancé, Prince Boglox of Stupid World, and his henchmen show up to Earth —known to them as Boring World — to reclaim his runaway bride. After a brush up in Anaïs’ high school, Prince Boglox takes Fauna back to Candy World to consummate their marriage.
But Anaïs won’t give up her newfound love without a fight and follows the two to Candy World, where more erotic, candy-themed chaos — think prisons made up of chocolate, candy cane French maids, and honey-based lubricant — ensues. She eventually finds Fauna, confronts the prince, and the two gals escape to ride off into the sunset. The end.
Or at least, that’s how it could have ended. Instead, Migdal used what other writers would consider the conclusion of Anaïs and Fauna’s story as a jumping-off point, sending the two on an intergalactic journey.
The two travel to many different, deviant worlds filled with horny characters — including lesbian pirates and transitioning mermen in Pirate World, would-be masked vigilantes and their sidekicks in Super City, and corrupt businessmen who charge you to say hello in Corporate World — to name just a few.
Anaïs and Fauna won’t be alone as they hop from world to world — and it’s not just Prince Boglox they need to worry about. The two are pursued by Fervid Wexler, a naive American Federal Agent who’s convinced that the two are terrorists plotting to take over Boring World, and Mallory, a sexually-deviant, magical witch who has her own evil plans for the star-crossed lovers of “Curvy.”
Will Anaïs get her happy ending with Fauna? She’ll have to conquer a few more worlds and confront some unexpected villains to do so, but she’s certainly up to the challenge. And hopefully, readers will be too.
Full disclosure: I had trouble getting into “Curvy” — the first chapter is a bit rough around the edges (which, to be fair, could be said about a lot of webcomics). The story got better with every chapter as Migdal takes his characters — and the readers — from one well-crafted world to another.
And a warning: the story is very sexual and explicit. There are lots of (well-illustrated) dicks, tits, and vaginas on nearly every page. I’m no prude, but I worried that 500-plus pages of sex and sex jokes would get old. Thankfully it doesn’t — mainly due to the fact that pretty much all of the sex in “Curvy” is queer. Very queer.
Migdal has the comedic sensibility for more than just a few sex zingers, and his best jokes are the subtle yet sharp ones that double as commentary on our own Boring World.
“Curvy” was originally released in black and white illustrations, where it is still available for free online on the book’s website (c.urvy.org). For “The Complete Curvy,” beautifully colored with pink and teal accents that help the pages pop, you can buy a copy on Iron Circus’s website for $50 (ironcircus.com/product/the-complete-curvy).
And for more comics by Sylvan Migdal, follow him on Twitter @SylvanMigdal.
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